Image: bruce mars / Unsplash
The holidays mean it’s time to celebrate! However, for teams distributed far and wide, the challenge of coming together is very real. The good news is that virtual Christmas parties can be just as fun and festive as in-person events—but you have to get creative to make it work.
Whether your team members are tucked away in Melbourne coworking spaces, house-sitting in rural England, travelling through Africa, or staying in an abandoned village in France, you can celebrate the season together. These six virtual Christmas party ideas are perfect for distributed teams:
Dress To Impress—Festive Style!
Set a theme so everybody knows what to wear for the call. Ugly sweaters, holiday film characters, Winter Wonderland—the possibilities are endless. You could ask everyone to do a little presentation of their costume, and potentially offer a prize for best voted outfit. It’s a great way to include everyone and get some festive fun into your virtual office party. Just be understanding if your more introverted team members don’t want to make a big song and dance of their outfits.
A Virtual Gift Exchange
A virtual gift exchange is a fun way to make a festive virtual office call feel like an in-person event. It could be a secret Santa, or a dollar gift rule—whatever suits your team. There are plenty of options, from gift vouchers to mailing in advance of the event.
Do make sure that there are some banned items and some universal guidelines everyone can follow. AKA, nothing risqué and nothing that would be deemed “not safe for work’, even if team members would exchange such gifts outside of work. Keep it clean, inclusive, and fun.
A Festive Quiz
According to IMDB, It’s A Wonderful Life is the most famous Christmas film, followed by Die Hard. You can ask questions about the most famous Christmas films in a festive quiz for your virtual team! For even more fun, divide everyone into teams and add prizes for motivation. There are also apps and platforms you can use to help make the quiz creation really easy.
Learn Together
Nine out of ten adults are learning a new skill at any one time. The truth is that, no matter what age we are, humans just love to learn. Why not utilize that enthusiasm at your virtual festive meetup by hiring a professional to do a virtual demonstration you can all join in with?
A mixologist, for example, can help you all learn how to make festive alcoholic or non-alcoholic cocktails from the comfort of your own home. Or how about a singing teacher who can get you all warbling away some holiday songs together. What a great way to create a fun and memorable moment you all share.
Cozy Holiday Movie Night
Encourage everyone to gather snacks, pajamas, hot chocolate, and duvets for a virtual movie night together. Use a streaming platform everyone has access to, so you can synchronize watching a movie everyone agrees to watch. Whether you laugh, cry, or both, you’ll all be doing it together!
A Festive Talent Show
Why not hold a festive talent show where you all showcase your special talents to each other? If some of your team members claim they have no special gifts, you can create a category for the best useless talent. Whether one of you can whistle with carved vegetables, or somebody has an exceptional ability to fit their fist in their mouth—no skill is unwelcome! Have prizes, and be ready to impress your teammates with your most ridiculous ability!
A sense of togetherness can be achieved in a virtual meeting, you just need to be creative and plan it well in advance. Your merry meeting will be the talk of the team for months to come, and for all the right reasons!
